Sadly for us, the American people, the largest pots of money have the biggest number of staunch protectors in the form of lobbyists and interest groups.

Politicians want pork for their home districts, and interest groups want grants, loans, guarantees, tax preferences, and other government privileges. Both political parties have wasted the taxpayers’ money when in control.

While Washington continues to complain about spending, and what programs should be cut, the federal government somehow manages to find billions of dollars to squander on frivolous projects that range from a $384,989 grant for Yale University to study the duck penis to $1.9 million for “lifestyle” lessons for Senate staffers.

Yes…you read that correctly. These are just two examples referred to by U.S. Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., in his annual book that looks at items he considers wasteful and "low-priority" spending by the federal government. The 100 examples Coburn singles out in his ‘Wastebook 2013’ was released two months ago.

Senator Coburn has always been a firm believer in small government. His ‘Wastebook 2013’, which is his fifth year highlighting such federal spending, delineates $30 billion the federal government wasted in 2013 on "questionable and lower-priority" programs, which in his assessment is only a fraction of more than $200 billion that the government throws away as a result of fraud, waste, duplication and mismanagement.

Of course agencies that received these funds don't consider it useless. The 177-page report draws attention to programs from the departments of Defense to Agriculture, from NASA to the National Institutes of Health.

Without further ado, below are selections from Coburn’s report highlighting useless government programs funded with your money (the full report can be found here).

$10 million for National Guard advertising tie-ins with the “Soldier of Steel” movie, despite budget cuts reducing the Guard’s strength by 8,000 soldiers.

$7 billion for the Pentagon to destroy vehicles and other military equipment used in wars in the Middle East rather than sell or ship the items back to the United States.

$17.5 million for special tax exemptions for Nevada brothels, including tax deductions for groceries, wages for prostitutes, rent and utilities.

Nearly $1 million since 2010 for the National Endowment of Humanities “Popular Romance Project,” which studies romance novels, films, comics and Internet fan fiction.

$630,000 spent by the State Department to buy followers on its Facebook and Twitter accounts.

$325,525 for a National Institutes of Health study that found wives would be happier if they could calm down faster during arguments with their husbands.

$150,000 to support the Puppets Take Long Island festival in Sag Harbor.

In January 2013, Congress passed a bill to provide $60.4 billion for the areas devastated by Hurricane Sandy. However, instead of rushing aid to the people who need it most, state-level officials in New York and New Jersey spent the money on tourism-related TV advertisements.

Since NASA is no longer conducting space flights, they have plenty of time and money to fund a YouTube TV show and cartoon series called “Green Ninja” in which a man dressed in a Green Ninja costume teaches children about global warming.

One of NASA’s next research missions won’t be exploring an alien planet or distant galaxy. Instead, the space agency is spending $3 million to go to Washington, D.C. and study one of the greatest mysteries in the universe—how Congress works.

One federal agency is charging other offices and taxpayers to provide government reports that are largely available free of charge on the Internet.

It is essentially the “let me Google that for you” office of the federal government.

Federal agencies and tax payers pay the National Technical Information Service, which is part of the Department of Commerce millions of dollars each year to provide government reports can are available for free online and can be found with a simple Google search.

In addition to the above frivolous programs, the federal government could also save tens of billions of dollars each year by trimming or eliminating duplicative programs.

Last year, The Government Accountability Office found 162 examples of government duplication or other inefficiencies while analyzing programs in virtually all major federal departments and agencies over three years.

The economy is improving for some; however, the effects of reckless public policy and deregulation prompted by the disproportionate political influence of big money still remain for far too many Americans. T

here continues to be too many people without a job, and those who eventually find one may have to take whatever they can find to survive, not necessarily what they want or deserve.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. always said that unemployment was a miscarriage of justice. In one of his last sermons, King said, "If a man doesn't have a job or an income, he has neither life nor liberty nor the possibility for the pursuit of happiness. He merely exists."

As the elected representatives of the people, Washington must find its moral and ethical compass, and shove aside this continuing nightmare of political gridlock.

The trivial and obsessive partisan games that plague American politics must stop. Much more important than the next election or winning an ideological argument are the lives of decent hardworking Americans.

Rogette Harris is a PennlLive/Patriot-News community columnist. Her work appears monthly.